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On the Tonal Unity in the Melodies of Japanese Folk-Music in Modern Times

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On the Tonal Unity in the Melodies of Japanese Folk-Music in Modern Times On the tonal unity in the melodies of Japanese folk-music in modern times 著者 Aizawa Mutuo journal or Tohoku psychologica folia publication title volume 11 number 1-2 page range 1-8 year 1944-05-31 URL http://hdl.handle.net/10097/00127292 On the tonal unity in the melodies of Japanese folk-music in modern times1 By Mutuo Aizawa (,m 1" 11t 9l!: ~l (Hukusima Normal School) Contents 1. On the variety of Japanese music . 2. Problem .. 2 3. Experiment . 4 4. Results ............ 7 5. Summary of results and conclusions 8 1. On the variety of Japanese music This article is the report of a study on the musical scales of our folk-music. It may be proper, however, to consider briefly Japanese music in general before we proceed to the explanation of our problem. To-day, we Japanese are enjoying various kinds of music. It would not be too much to say that we enjoy all of the eastern and all of the western music. We had our own music from the earliest times of our history. Since the culture of the Asiatic Continent entered our country, musical compositions from Korea, from China, from Manchuria, from Annam, and even from India, Central Asia were performed, and new varieties of performance of our ancient music and new compositions were born under their influence. Various kinds of musical instruments were added to our original ones, too. The musical compositions of our an- I This research is a part of one which was made in the Psychological Laboratory of Tohoku Imperial University under the support of Nippon Gakuzyutu Sinkokwai. 2 Mutuo Aizawa cestors and those entered from foreign countries have survived until to-day under the summarizing name of "Gagaku". Gagaku, which has more than one thousand years of tradition, is the music of the ceremonies of the Imperial Court. It is performed at Sinto shrines and Buddhist temples too, generally on a small scale. It is not so frequent of course that common people hear this music regularly performed. However, our national anthem "Kimigayo" and even some of the songs sung in our national schools (primary schools) are composed in one of the modes of Gagaku. Besides the tradition of this classical music from ancient times, our ancestors had different forms of more popular music. Several kinds of it are performed and enjoyed until to-day. Among them, "Nogaku" is the most aristocratic and was the favorite musical art of knightly families and Samurai since the Muromati period. "Yokyoku" or "Utai" is the vocal music belonging to it. "Samisen" music, "Koto" music, and ''Syakuhati" music, that were developed in the Edo period, are quite widely enjoyed. They are the products of the most peculiar Japanese culture of the period, and are generally called "Hogaku" (Japanese music in the narrow sense). In addition to these different kinds of music which have been developed by professional musicians, we have many folk-songs in each district of our country. In this article, 'Japanese folk-music in modern times' means the "Hogaku" and these folk-songs. In the Meizi Era Western music entered our country. The works of the composers of European countries, as well classical as modern, are no less widely enjoyed by us than "Hogaku". The tone system and the techniques of composition of Western music, together with the modes and styles of our proper music, form to-day the basis of our musical production. On such basis new Japanese national music is growing now. 2. Problem Our chief problem is the tonal unity of "In-Sen", one of the most widely noticeable scales in our folk-music in modern times. Later we shall touch upon the situation of this scale in our history of music and the theory of music. The problem of the tonal unity in European music has been investigated in the theory of scales, in the theory of harmony, and even in the psychology of music. E. Kurth published a very interest- On the tonal unity in the melodies of Japanese folk-music in modern times 3 ing theory on the nature of the most elemental scale i. e. the major scale. And yet, the problem is not entirely solved of course. We find many questions half solved or practically solved, but not solved, when they are scientifically or psychologically examined. So the author of the present article also once experimentally investi­ gated how the major and the minor scale are experienced by the Japanese in general.1 His next problem was that of the tonality or the tonal unity of Japanese melodies. Concerning the tonal unity in Japanese music, we have the theories of "Gagaku" from old times, and since the Meizi Era, the studies on the scales of our folk-music. In these, however, some questions are not fully explained. As we deal here with our folk­ music in modern times, we do not refer to the theories of "Gagaku". In our country, the theoretical study of folk-music was made almost by none until a few scholars and musicians began to examine the tonal nature of it in the Meizi Era. The most important book written at that time is "Zokugaku-Senritu-Ko" (A study on the melodies of folk-music) by Rokusiro Uehara. He investigated the nature of the melodies of Samisen music, Koto music, Syakuhati music, folk­ songs, and Yokyoku, and found that the most elemental scales in all these, except Yokyoku and old Syakuhati music, were two kinds of pentatonic ones. He classified them into Miyakobusi-scale (the scale of city tunes) and the Inakabusi-scale (the scale of country tunes),and named the former "In-Sen", and the latter ''Yo-Sen". "Sen" means "mode" or "scale". "Yo" means the sun, the male, the positive etc., and "In" means the moon, the female, the negative etc. "Yo-Sen" and "In-Sen" have the following forms: _ /ascending . • C d f g a# c' Yo-sen"' . descendmg . C d f g a c' /ascending . C db f g a# c' In-Sen"' . descendmg • C db f g ab c' Of course all the melodies of Japanese folk-music m modern times are not necessarily composed in those scales only. However, it is true that they are most important and most widely noticeable, and many authors of the theory of Japanese music writing after U ehara's above mentioned work agree regarding this point. Questicns exist only concerning the ascending and the descending 1 M. Ai z aw a, An experimental study of the consciousness of tonality. I. On major tonality. II. On minor tonality. Toh. Psych. Fol. 3, 1935-1936. 4 Mutuo Aizawa forms of the scales and the establishment of the scales, especially of "In-Sen", in the history of Japanese music. S. Tanaka, H. Tanabe, T. Iba, S. Huzii, K. Sim6sa published opinions con­ curring in the main point. K. Boda's theory1 is the only exception the author of the present article could find. Boda collected many folk-song melodies from various districts and concludes that the elemental forms of those melodies (the scales) are as below. Yo-Sen. c d f g a# c' Jn-Sen . c db f gb a# c' Boda's "Yo-Sen" is the ascending form of Uehara's, while his "In-Sen" is quite different from its generally acknowledged form sinLe Uehara. Moreover, he applied his so-called "In-Sen" to a popular Koto song "Sakura Sakura", which is generally thought to be composed in "In-Sen", and also to "Usioi-Uta in Nanbu". The latter which is sung in the north-eastern district of our country seems to be composed in the minor pentatonic scale (the minor missing the Fourth and the Seventh), and its origin is disputed by several authors, because a melody in that scale is generally thought to be exceptional among our folk-songs. (As was mentioned before, "In-" and "Yo-Sen" are not the only basis of our folk-music. It seems that the melodies of our folk-songs especially stand on various basis, though the above-mentioned ones are most widely provable. K. Simosa's work2 also suggests this.) Thus our problems: Is really the generally recognized form of "In-Sen" psychologically true ? Is really the "Kyii"3 of "In-Sen" the centre of the tonal unity of it in our consciousness of tonality4? Is Boda's "In-Sen" really a scale which indicates the state of tonal unity? In what form do we feel the tonal unity of the melody of "Usioi-Uta"? 3. Experiment The principle of the method In our foregoing investigation5, we found a natural tendency 1 See K. Boda, Nippon-Senritu to Kwasei, 2601 (Janapese melody and harmDny, 1941). 2 K. Simosa, Nippon-Onkai no Hanasi, 2602 (On Japanese musical scales, 1942). 3 In the theory of Japanese music from old times, the name "Kyii" (a') has been given to the Primo of the scales. 4 See M. Aizawa, op. cit. 5 M. Aizawa, op. cit. On the tonal unity in the melodies of Japanese folk-music in modem times 5 that two melodies, either in Major or in Minor, sung or imagined by us successively in a natural and easy attitude show the same key or stand in the relation of the most related key. By utilizing this natural tendency and applying the same method (as we used before) to melodies in "In-Sen", we are able to examine the tonal character of "In-Sen". The observers and the melodies used in the experiment This experiment is not that of a general psychology, but that of a special psychology of musical experience.
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